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The Arts Intel Report

Erwin Wurm: Trap of the Truth

Erwin Wurm, Big Kastenmann, 2012.

June 10, 2023 – Apr 23, 2024
West Bretton, Wakefield WF4 4LG

In 2017, Erwin Wurm unveiled a freight truck outside the Austrian Pavilion at the Venice Art Biennale—it had an orange cab and was balanced vertically on its front bumper. Visitors could climb stairs to the top, where an enclosure read “Stand quiet and look at the Mediterranean Sea.” A month before that, in Vienna, Wurm positioned Fat House—a simple hall-and-parlor house with swollen walls—opposite a Baroque palace. Playful works like these have been staples of Wurm’s practice since the late 1980s. “I am interested in the everyday life,” he once said. “All the materials that surrounded me could be useful, as well as the objects, topics involved in contemporary society.” This mega-scale retrospective presents more than 100 works by Wurm, including 55 indoor sculptures, 19 outdoor sculptures, paintings, drawings, and photographs. —Elena Clavarino

Photo: © Studio Erwin Wurm